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Peru Culinary Landscape Discovery: Lima, Cusco and Beyond
Peru Culinary Landscape Discovery
Duration
15 DaysStarts In
LimaRoute
Lima, Paracas, Arequipa , Puno, Cusco
Peru is a country that feeds every sense simultaneously — and this extraordinary 15-day luxury journey has been designed to savour every single one of them. From the raw Pacific flavours of Callao's seafood markets and the freshly harvested scallops of Paracas Bay to the baroque grandeur of Arequipa's White City, the sacred silence of Lake Titicaca at 3,812 metres, and the extraordinary living cuisine of Cusco's celebrated cooking scene, this is Peru experienced through its most refined and immersive lens. Ancient Inca citadels, condors soaring above the world's deepest canyon, a Vistadome 360° train through cloud forest to Machu Picchu, and a cocktail walking tour through the cobblestone streets of the former Inca capital — every day of this journey delivers something genuinely extraordinary. This is luxury travel in one of the world's most remarkable destinations. Prepare to be completely undone by Peru.
Includes
- Driver/Guide: Private as per itinerary
- Keytours 24-hour emergency assistance
- Private arrival and departure transfers as per itinerary
- Accommodations of your choice
- Sightseeing tours and/or activites of your choice
Excludes
- Items of a personal nature
- All other items not mentioned as included
- Domestic flights; please inquire with your Keytours travel consultant
- Travel insurance; please inquire with your Keytours travel consultant
- Gratuities for drivers, guides, and escorts
Itinerary
Day
1
1
Day 1
Day 1: Arrival in Lima
Touch down at Jorge Chávez International Airport and let your private transfer carry you to your luxury hotel in the heart of Miraflores — Lima's most elegant and vibrant district, perched dramatically above the Pacific Ocean. The rest of the day belongs entirely to you. Settle into your beautifully appointed suite, take your first swim in the hotel pool with the Pacific stretching to the horizon beyond, indulge in a spa treatment, or simply sink into a sun lounger on the terrace with a cold pisco sour and let the city's extraordinary energy wash over you from a distance. Tonight, dinner at the hotel or a short walk to one of Miraflores' acclaimed waterfront restaurants — the perfect gentle introduction to one of the world's great culinary capitals.
Day
2
2
Day 2
Day 2: Seafood Flavours, Urban Art & Lima's Heritage
Lima reveals two completely different worlds today — the raw, creative energy of Callao and the refined grandeur of the city's colonial heart. Begin at the Delicias de Callao — Lima's most celebrated seafood market and street food destination, where the freshest Pacific catches arrive daily and the ceviches, tiraditos, and seafood stalls deliver flavors of extraordinary intensity just minutes from the dock. Continue to Monumental Callao — a breathtaking urban art transformation of a former rough neighborhood into one of Latin America's most extraordinary open-air galleries, where world-class murals cover every surface in extraordinary color. The afternoon moves elegantly to the Larco Museum — one of the world's finest pre-Columbian art collections set within a magnificent 18th-century vice-royal mansion. The day closes with a pisco sour and chilcano demonstration — covering the art of Peru's most celebrated cocktails with a passionate local expert.
Day
3
3
Day 3
Day 3: Lima to Paracas
After a leisurely breakfast your private transfer heads south along the Panamerican Highway through dramatic coastal desert where the Andes meet the Pacific in a landscape of extraordinary austere beauty — approximately three to four hours of spectacular scenery before arriving at the small port town of Paracas, gateway to one of Peru's most pristine and protected natural environments. Check into your luxury beachfront hotel on the shores of Paracas Bay and allow the rest of the day to unfold entirely at your own pace. The hotel facilities, the extraordinary quality of the afternoon light over the bay, and the complete absence of any agenda make this one of the most genuinely restorative days of the entire journey. Sunset over the Paracas Bay is simply unmissable.
Day
4
4
Day 4
Day 4: Marine Wildlife & Fresh Scallop Tasting
Paracas delivers its most extraordinary day. Rise early for a boat excursion to the legendary Ballestas Islands — teeming with hundreds of thousands of Humboldt penguins, sea lions, Peruvian boobies, cormorants, and pelicans in a wildlife spectacle of breathtaking abundance that consistently leaves visitors speechless. Return to shore for the day's most distinctive and delicious experience — a visit to an artisanal mariculture operation on the bay, where local fishermen have been cultivating scallops in the Paracas Reserve's protected waters for generations. Pull on waders and wade into the shallows to harvest scallops directly from their beds, bringing them to the shore for an extraordinary tasting of freshly harvested scallops — raw, ceviche-style, and grilled — an intimate farm-to-fork experience of extraordinary freshness in one of the Pacific's most productive marine environments.
Day
5
5
Day 5
Day 5: Paracas to Arequipa
A scenic return journey along the Panamerican Highway carries you back to Lima for your domestic flight south to Arequipa — Peru's second city and arguably its most beautiful. The flight over the Andes delivers extraordinary aerial views of the snow-capped Cordillera before landing at Rodriguez Ballón International Airport. Your private transfer takes you to your luxury hotel in the heart of the White City — so called for the extraordinary pearlescent sillar volcanic stone from which its baroque colonial center was constructed, glowing luminously against the dramatic backdrop of the El Misti volcano above. Check in, take in the extraordinary surroundings from your terrace, and enjoy the hotel's facilities as Arequipa's warm evening light bathes the city in an extraordinary golden glow.
Day
6
6
Day 6
Day 6: Arequipa's Traditional Cuisine & Historic Treasures
Arequipa is Peru's most underrated culinary destination — and today it reveals both its extraordinary food culture and its breathtaking colonial heritage in equal, magnificent measure. A morning tour of the UNESCO World Heritage historic center winds through extraordinary baroque colonial streets and the magnificent Plaza de Armas before entering the crown jewel of the city — the Santa Catalina Monastery, a vast 16th-century convent city of cobblestone streets, vivid orange and blue painted walls, and peaceful cloisters that feels completely removed from the modern world. The afternoon immerses you in Arequipa's legendary traditional cuisine — rocoto relleno, chupe de camarones, and adobo arequipeño at a celebrated local picanteríia — before the Yanahuara viewpoint delivers one of the most breathtaking sunset panoramas in all of Peru.
Day
7
7
Day 7
Day 7: Arequipa to Puno
A spectacular scenic drive east from Arequipa carries you through one of the most extraordinary landscapes in South America — crossing the high-altitude puna grasslands of the altiplano as the road climbs toward 4,900 metres before descending toward the shimmering expanse of Lake Titicaca on the horizon. The journey passes through remote Andean communities, ancient agricultural terraces, and vast open plains where vicuña graze in the thin mountain air and the sky feels impossibly close and impossibly blue. Arrive at Puno and check directly into your luxury hotel situated right on the shores of Lake Titicaca — the world's highest navigable lake at 3,812 metres above sea level. The late afternoon view of the lake from your room as the Bolivian mountains glow on the far horizon is one of the great natural spectacles of South America.
Day
8
8
Day 8
Day 8: Sacred Archaeology & Authentic Lake Traditions
A profoundly moving day that combines ancient funerary architecture, authentic community culture, and the extraordinary experience of casting a fishing line into the world's highest navigable lake. Begin at Sillustani — one of the most dramatic and mysterious archaeological sites in all of Peru, where the Colla people built extraordinary chullpas — tall cylindrical funeral towers — on a peninsula above a shimmering highland lake, their construction so advanced that the upper stones are larger than the lower ones in a feat of engineering that still baffles researchers. Continue to the village of Atuncolla for a traditional regional lunch with a local family — deeply authentic, warmly generous, and completely unforgettable. The afternoon delivers a uniquely peaceful pleasure — fly casting on Lake Titicaca, guided by local fishermen on one of the world's most extraordinary bodies of water.
Day
9
9
Day 9
Day 9: Puno to Cusco
Today's journey between Peru's two most extraordinary destinations offers a choice of two equally magnificent experiences. The Belmond Andean Explorer — South America's first luxury sleeper train — departs Puno and crosses the breathtaking altiplano in elegantly restored vintage carriages with fine dining, observation cars, and spa facilities, arriving in Cusco in a state of complete comfort and wonder. Alternatively, a private scenic road journey stops at three extraordinary cultural treasures en route — the village of Pucara famous for its ceramic bulls, the remarkable Raqchi temple of extraordinary Inca architecture, and the breathtaking baroque church of Andahuaylillas — the Sistine Chapel of the Americas. Either way, the journey is as extraordinary as the destination. Check into your luxury Cusco hotel and rest.
Day
10
10
Day 10
Day 10: Cusco's Historic Centre & Sacsayhuamán
Cusco — the ancient capital of the Inca Empire and one of the most extraordinary cities in the Americas — reveals its magnificent layers today. Begin at Qorikancha — the Temple of the Sun, once the most sacred building in the entire Inca Empire, its golden walls stripped bare by the Spanish conquistadors and a Dominican convent built directly on top — where the extraordinary contrast of Inca stonework of impossible precision beneath Spanish colonial baroque architecture tells the story of the conquest more powerfully than any museum. Continue to Sacsayhuamán — the breathtaking Inca fortress on the hill above Cusco where massive stone blocks weighing up to 300 tonnes are fitted together with such extraordinary precision that not even a piece of paper can be slipped between the joints — one of the most awe-inspiring archaeological sites on earth.
Day
11
11
Day 11
Day 11: Full Immersion Peruvian Cooking Class
Today Cusco's extraordinary culinary heritage takes center stage in the most hands-on and deeply satisfying way imaginable. A full-day immersion Peruvian cooking class begins at the San Pedro Market — where your chef guide leads you through the extraordinary colors, aromas, and flavors of the most important ingredients in Peruvian cuisine, from native potato varieties and Andean chillies to exotic jungle fruits and the finest local cuts of meat. Return to the kitchen to spend the morning mastering the techniques behind Peru's most celebrated dishes — ceviche, causa, lomo saltado, ají de gallina, and the perfect pisco sour — before sitting down to enjoy the extraordinary feast you created, paired with Peruvian wines and the warmth of a cooking experience that goes far beyond a class and feels genuinely like being welcomed into someone's home.
Day
12
12
Day 12
Day 12: Sacred Valley: Native Potatoes, Andean Wine, Maras & Moray
Transfer to the Sacred Valley for a day of extraordinary flavor, natural beauty, and ancient agricultural genius. Begin with a deeply immersive native potato tasting and Andean wine experience — discovering the extraordinary biodiversity of Peru's potato heritage, with over 3,000 native varieties cultivated in the Sacred Valley alone, paired with wines from Peru's emerging high-altitude wine regions in a tasting that reveals unexpected depth and sophistication. Continue to the remarkable Maras salt mines — thousands of individual salt pools terraced into the hillside above the valley, shimmering pink and white in the afternoon light — before exploring the extraordinary circular terraces of Moray, an Inca agricultural laboratory of concentric terraces creating different microclimates at each level that remains one of the most architecturally extraordinary and enigmatic sites in the entire Sacred Valley.
Day
13
13
Day 13
Day 13: Sacred Valley to Machu Picchu
The day the entire journey has been building toward. Board the extraordinary Peru Rail Vistadome 360° train — panoramic glass roof panels and oversized windows framing the breathtaking descent from high Andean valley into lush subtropical cloud forest as the train winds alongside the sacred Urubamba River gorge. Arrive in Aguas Calientes and ascend by bus to the entrance of the Historic Sanctuary of Machu Picchu — and as the ancient citadel reveals itself in all its extraordinary glory above the clouds, the magnitude of what you are witnessing settles slowly and completely. A private guided tour of the citadel brings every stone, terrace, and temple alive with history and mystery before a magnificent lunch at Sumaq Hotel — the finest dining experience available on the mountain — before the afternoon train returns you to the Sacred Valley.
Day
14
14
Day 14
Day 14: Cusco Cocktail Walking Tour & Pisco Experience
A final full day in Cusco that celebrates the city's extraordinary drinks culture through one of the most enjoyable and social experiences of the entire journey. A guided cocktail walking tour leads you through the historic center stopping at celebrated bars, hidden speakeasies, and artisan distilleries — tasting the full range of Peru's extraordinary pisco expressions from classic to contemporary alongside the cocktails that have made Lima and Cusco's bar scene internationally celebrated. Between stops the guide weaves in stories of Cusco's extraordinary history, hidden architectural details, and the best-kept local secrets of one of the world's most atmospheric cities. The evening concludes at one of Cusco's finest rooftop bars — cold pisco sour in hand, the Plaza de Armas illuminated below, and the entire extraordinary journey spread out behind you like a perfect memory.
Day
15
15
Day 15
Day 15: Morning at Leisure & Departure
A final unhurried morning in Cusco — one last café con leche at a corner table overlooking the Plaza de Armas, one last wander through the cobblestone streets of San Blas, and one last browse through the boutiques of Calle Hatunrumiyoc for alpaca scarves, handmade silver, and Peruvian chocolate to carry home. Your private transfer arrives for the journey to Alejandro Velasco Astete Airport and your onward flight. Peru leaves its mark on every traveler who gives it their full attention — the flavors, the archaeology, the landscapes, the kindness of its people, and the extraordinary living culture of the Inca world combine to create something that stays with you not just in photographs and keepsakes but in the quiet, permanent way that only the truly extraordinary does.
Frequently Asked Questions
The Peru Culinary Landscape Discovery package includes the following: - Private driver/guide services as per the itinerary - Keytours 24-hour emergency assistance - Private arrival and departure transfers - Accommodations of your choice - Sightseeing tours and/or activities of your choice. Please note that domestic flights, travel insurance, and gratuities for drivers, guides, and escorts are not included and should be arranged separately with your Keytours travel consultant.
Travel between destinations in this itinerary is facilitated through a combination of private transfers and domestic flights. For example, you will have private transfers from Lima to Paracas and from Paracas back to Lima for your flight to Arequipa. Additionally, the journey from Puno to Cusco can be made via the luxury Belmond Andean Explorer train or a scenic road trip with stops at cultural sites. All transportation details will be confirmed in your final itinerary.
Yes, this package is designed to be customizable according to your preferences. You can choose your accommodations based on your desired level of luxury and comfort, as well as select specific sightseeing tours and activities that align with your interests. Keytours Vacations encourages you to discuss your preferences with a travel consultant to create a personalized experience that suits your needs.
This itinerary features a variety of extraordinary highlights, including: - Exploring Lima's vibrant culinary scene and seafood markets - Visiting the stunning Ballestas Islands and tasting fresh scallops in Paracas - Discovering Arequipa's colonial architecture and traditional cuisine - Experiencing the breathtaking landscapes of Lake Titicaca - Immersing yourself in Cusco's rich history and vibrant culinary culture - A visit to Machu Picchu, one of the world's most iconic archaeological sites. Each day is crafted to provide immersive experiences that showcase Peru's unique culture and flavors.
No, travel insurance is not included in the Peru Culinary Landscape Discovery package. It is highly recommended that travelers arrange their own travel insurance to cover any unforeseen circumstances. You can inquire about travel insurance options with your Keytours travel consultant, who can provide recommendations based on your needs.
This itinerary includes a moderate level of physical activity. Travelers should be prepared for walking tours, some hiking, and potentially high-altitude experiences, particularly in Cusco and Puno, which are at significant elevations. The activities are designed to be accessible, but it is advisable for travelers to be in good health and to consult with a healthcare provider if they have concerns about altitude or physical exertion.
If there are changes to transportation schedules during your trip, Keytours Vacations will provide assistance to ensure your travel plans remain as seamless as possible. Our team offers 24-hour emergency assistance, so you can reach out for support if needed. It’s important to review your final itinerary and confirmation documents for any updates prior to your departure.
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